Poll Shows Dukakis Leads Bush; Many Reagan Backers Shift Sides

By E. J. DIONNE Jr.

Published: May 17, 1988

Michael S. Dukakis is capitalizing on deep public doubts about Vice President Bush and the Reagan Administration's handling of key issues and has emerged as the early favorite for the Presidential election in November, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News Poll.

The survey, conducted May 9-12, represented a significant advance for Mr. Dukakis since a Times/CBS News Poll in March when Mr. Bush had 46 percent and Mr. Dukakis had 45 percent.

In the latest poll, Governor Dukakis of Massachusetts led in all regions, but he ran especially well in the Northeast and Middle West. The poll found Mr. Dukakis with very substantial advantages over Mr. Bush among women, union members, Roman Catholics and blacks. Shift Since 1984 Election

Strikingly, 28 percent of those who said they voted for President Reagan in 1984 said they preferred Mr. Dukakis over Mr. Bush this time; only 9 percent of those who said they backed Walter F. Mondale in 1984 switched to Mr. Bush. Mr. Dukakis was also far ahead among those who said they did not vote in 1984, and he scored well even in groups where President Reagan continues to be popular - notably among voters under 30 years old.

One reason why Mr. Reagan's personal popularity may not helping Mr. Bush very much is that voters said that his Administration had performed poorly on key issues, notably drugs, which was named the nation's most important problem by 16 percent of the entire public, more than named any other. Democrats generally and Mr. Dukakis in particular were seen as more likely to deal with the problem effectively than were the Republicans and Mr. Bush.

Polls taken six months before ELection Day cannot be taken as predictive of the ultimate election outcome. Robert Teeter, Mr. Bush's poll taker, said that polls taken now may be overestimating Mr. Dukakis, since voters know little about him except the largely favorable news that he has won a a string of primaries since March. In the latest survey, Mr. Dukakis led his only remaining opponent, the Rev. Jesse Jackson, by a margin of better than 3 to 1 among Democratic primary voters.

In theory, a poll taken among as many people as were involved in this one should accurately reflect public opinion within three percentage points in either direction.

The survey did contain some hopeful signs for Mr. Bush and the Republicans.

Many voters, for example, worried that Mr. Dukakis may lack the exprience to be President, and the electorate as a whole sees Republicans as safer than the Democrats on foreign policy and defense.

In addition, half of the country's registered voters said they did not yet have an opinion of Mr. Dukakis, giving Republicans an opportunity to stir public doubt about his capacity to handle the Presidency.

Still, among those who do have a view of him, Mr. Dukakis was viewed favorably. Over all, 38 percent of registered voters had a favorable view of him, while 14 percent had an unfavorable view. Opinions About Bush

Two-thirds of the voters have an opinion of Mr. Bush, and it is not particularly positive. The Vice President was viewed favorably by 33 percent of registered voters, unfavorably by 35 percent.

The Republicans have been trying to paint Mr. Dukakis as a liberal, and the poll suggests they have good reason to try to do so. For now, only 27 percent of registered voters think of Mr. Dukakis as a liberal and this appears to be helping him win conservative votes.

The poll found that only about one-third of conservatives said they saw Mr. Dukakis as a liberal. In this group, Mr. Bush beat Mr. Dukakis handily, by a margin of about two to one. But among the two-thirds of conservatives who did not think of Mr. Dukakis as a liberal, he ran about even with Mr. Bush.

Mr. Bush, the poll indicated, is suffering from the worst of two worlds: He is losing support because a majority of voters feel the Reagan Administration has performed poorly on problems that have become key election issues. At the same time, the Vice President is not even inheriting the popularity that Mr. Reagan does enjoy.

These were results on several emergent issues where voters think the Administration is doing badly, and doubt Mr. Bush would do much better:

* Only 32 percent of registered voters said the Reagan Administration has done a good job handling the budget deficit; 60 percent said it has not.

* On the problem of illegal drugs, 36 percent said the Administration was doing a good job; 55 percent said it was not.

* On dealing with the conflicts in Central America, 35 percent rated the Administration as having done well; 52 percent said it had not.

* When asked whether Mr. Dukakis or Mr. Bush would do better job on each of these problems, roughly half the voters said the two men would do about the same or had no view. But two-thirds of the rest thought Mr. Dukakis would do a better job than Mr. Bush on drugs and the budget deficit; and nearly three-fifths thought Mr. Dukakis would do better on Central America. Key Leading Indicator

Moreover, when voters were asked which party would do best at handling whatever they identified as the nation's most important problem - a question poll takers regard as a key leading indicator of voting decision - 40 percent said the Democrats and 29 percent said the Republicans. Democrats have never enjoyed such an advantage since the Times/CBS News Poll first asked the question in 1980, when indeed the Republicans had that big a margin before Mr. Reagan's first victory.

Nonetheless, Mr. Reagan continues to enjoy a certain popularity. The survey found that 48 percent of the public - 1,382 respondents, registered and unregistered - approved of Mr. Reagan's handling of his job, compared with 39 percent who disapproved, But in a hypothetical election matchup with Mr. Dukakis, Mr. Bush won the support of only 63 percent of those who approved of Mr. Reagan. He lost about a quarter of these pro-Reagan voters to Mr. Dukakis.

The gap between Mr. Reagan's approval and Mr. Bush's support was especially large among registered voters under 30. These voters approved Mr. Reagan's handling of his job by 55 percent to 40 percent who disapproved. Yet among young people who are registered to vote, Mr. Dukakis leads Mr. Bush, 47 percent to 41 percent. Attitude of Young Voters

One reason for this gap appeared to be that young people, despite their liking for Mr. Reagan, also like activist government, which is becoming increasingly popular with the electorate as a whole.

Repeating a question that has been posed periodically in Times/CBS News surveys since 1976, the latest poll asked: ''In general, government grows bigger as it provides more services. If you had to choose, would you rather have a smaller government providing fewer services, or a bigger government providing more services?''

In March 1980, when conservative Republicanism was on the rise, the voters chose smaller government over bigger government by a margin of 54 percent to 32 percent.

In the current survey, the public is evenly divided, 43 percent for smaller government to 44 percent for bigger government. Bigger government has not been this popular since November 1976, which is also the last time the Democrats won a Presidential election. At that time, 44 percent chose smaller government, and 44 percent, a bigger government.

In an attempt to gauge what impact Mr. Jackson would have on the Democratic chances if he were given the second spot on the ticket with Mr. Dukakis, the survey paired several possible Democratic Vice-Presidential candidates against a hypothetical Republican ticket of Mr. Bush and Gov. James M. Thompson of Illinois.

The survey found that with Mr. Jackson on the ticket, Mr. Dukakis's 10 point lead was cut to three points: Dukakis-Jackson got 45 percent; Bush-Thompson got 42 percent. On the other hand, Senator John Glenn of Ohio and, to a lesser extent, Senator Sam Nunn of Georgia, seemed to help Mr. Dukakis. The Dukakis-Nunn ticket defeated Bush-Thompson by 46 percent to 34 percent. The Dukakis-Glenn ticket beat Bush-Thompson by 49 percent to 34 percent. Mr. Jackson's liberalism, his inexperience in government, and his race all seemed to contribute to his doing worse than Mr. Glenn or Mr, Nunn. How the Poll Was Taken

The latest New York Times/CBS News Poll is based on telephone interviews conducted May 9 to 12 with 1,382 adults around the United States, excluding Alaska and Hawaii. Of that number 1,056 said that they were registered to vote.

The sample of telephone exchanges called was selected by a computer from a complete list of exchanges in the country. The exchanges were chosen so as to assure that each region of the country was represented in proportion to its population. For each exchange, the telephone numbers were formed by random digits, thus permitting access to both listed and unlisted residential numbers. The numbers were then screened to limit calls to residences.

The results have been weighted to take account of household size and number of residential telephones and to adjust for variations in the sample relating to region, race, sex, age and education.

In theory, in 19 cases out of 20 the results based on such samples will differ by no more than three percentage points in either direction from what would have been obtained by interviewing all adult Americans. The sampling error for registered voters is also plus or minus three percentage points. The potential error for smaller subgroups is larger.

In addition to sampling error, the practical difficulties of conducting any survey of public opinion may introduce other sources of error into the poll.

Graphs showing poll results comparing parties and front-runners; graph of poll results showing which parties are best able to handle problems facing the country from '80-'88 (all pg. A22) (NYT)